Improvement in boot or shoe tips



FLW'. fw. L W. Hi'.

i Emi asm Shoe Ting.

N0 160,835 Patented March16,i875.

HOLLIS W. MERRILL AND JAMES W. HOITT, OF LYNN, MASSACHUSETTS.

IMPROVEMENT IN BOOT OR SHOEMTIPS.

Specication forming part of Letters Patent No. l 60,835, dated March 16, 1875; application filed August 24, 1874..

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that we, HOLLIS W. MEERiLL and JAMES W. HOITT, of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts, have invented a certain Improved Boot or Shoe Tip, of which the following is a specification:

The subject of this invention is a tip, so called, or acovering or protection for the toes of boots or shoes; and the novelty of the inventionconsists in producing such articles from rawhide subjected to such a treatment as to render it of a'deep permanent black through its entire substance.

The drawing accompanying this specilication represents, in Figure l, a perspective view of our tip, and in Fig. 2 a view of a boot containing such tip.

In these drawings, our tip is shown at A an erect lip or ledge of a semicircular or other proper outline which shall best adapt it to the form of the toe of a boot or shoe, according to the style of the latter, such lip or tip being formed with a horizontal shelf or base,

B, which constitutes part and parcel of it. The particular form or size of this base or flange is not arbitrary, the only condition necessary to observe being that it shall be sufficiently llarge to be intercepted and secured by the stitching or nails by which the tip is secured to the boot. As before premised this tip is produced from rawhide, and in manufacturing it we prepare a hide by dyeing it in such a manner that the color entirely permeates it throughout, for which reason it presents at all times a neat appearance, and is not readily distinguished from the upper of the boot. The tip, while in a plastic or pliable state from -the dye-vat, or after being subsequently softened, is placed in a die and formed or molded into its perfect and complete state, as shown in Fig. l of the drawings, and it may at this time or a previous or subsequent stage be treated with a suitable waterproofing material, which shall render it completely impervious to moisture; but we have found in the practical tests to which we have subjected the article that rawhide in the hard state in which it remains after drying absorbs moisture very slowly, and that a water-proof treatment is probably unnecessary.

The tip, as above produced, is applied to a boot or shoe in the ordinary manner; and as metal tips corresponding to ours in the matter of form and use are now extensively in use it is not considered necessary to d-well in this specilicat-ion upon the manner of such application.

Our invention possesses several and prominent advantages over others in use. First, it can be manufactured at exceedingly'low cost, much less thanv any now or heretofore in the Vmarket of which we have any knowledge;

second, it cannot grow rusty or become dis-` Although we have stated that our tip is to be applied in the ordinary manner, yet we should make an exception to this general statement, since we have found in practice that we are able to apply the tip to a turned boot or shoe in the process of manufacture ot' the latter, as such tip, while in a plastic state, is readily turned with such boot or shoe. ln this instance it is simply introduced between the upper and out sole, and sewed together with them, afterward taking care of itself.

We claim- As an improved article of manufacture, a boot or shoe tip composed of rawhide permeated throughout with a suitable color, substantially as and for the purpose specified.

HOLLIS W. MERRILL. JAMES W. HOITT. Witnesses:

GEO. E. HICKS, W. E. BOAEDMAN.

BEIGE.; 

